AFC PINE AM

  This morning started off quite interesting. All week the boys have had the opportunity to play with the wind tunnel set up on our large carpet we typically use for our morning meetings. This is by far one of the more engaging activities because it provides a multitude of excitement and entertainment for everyone! Today though, we had a bit of a problem that everyone got involved in. One of the pieces of brightly colored cellophane was stuck on the ceiling!  B was the first to notice.  "Up!" He exclaimed as he got up onto his tippy toes and pointed towards the ceiling. We all turned and gazed upwards. There was the yellow piece of crinkly paper stuck to the ceiling tile. For the next few minutes every kid made it their mission to get the cellophane off the ceiling!  There were a variety of different tactics we tried: jumping, getting on our tippy toes, putting more scarves and cellophane in the tunnel, and lastly just yelling at it. It wasn't until the plug was...

  We spent our entire morning out at the sculpture park! It is far too nice of a day to stay inside and since we have spent a majority of February indoors, we figured it was time to get back out and play in a different part of the neighborhood. The kids not only did a great job walking all the way to the park, but played so great with one another and in the environment. It's so fun to look back on old blog posts and reflect on where they started and where they are now. So proud of all these kids! 

  I think I can speak for everyone when I say we were SO excited to take a little nature walk around the neighborhood and soak up the sunshine. As we walked the kids picked up anything that fancied them, but the most popular nature find were those prickly gumballs!  B & T were especially curious about the little spikes coming out of them. B did his best to carry as many as he could, while T was content with just holding one and then passing some out to whoever wanted one.  J found it particularly interesting to use a stick to hit the gumball around like a hockey puck!  As we walked the boys noticed the melting ice and snow, the birds singing, and the sun shining nice and bright. It was a great way to end our busy day 🌞

  Oh I am so happy to see everyone after so may days of being off! It was the perfect day to stay inside and get back into the swing of things. We had the opportunity to spend part of our morning in the collboratory (motor room)! The boys started off great and really stayed engaged with the ball wall in particular. It was a hotspot for fun!  B got it started as he began putting together multiple different tunnel pieces together to make a long tube for the ball to roll down.  B noticed there was a small barrier in his original design. The ball kept getting stuck! He was puzzled as he patiently waited for the ball to come out the other end. Nothing. Instead of getting upset, he decided to take the whole thing apart and use just once piece, his favorite!  This then inspired T to come over and play too!  T also grabbed some new pieces and began adding them to create a larger ball track. I love seeing this simple form of imitation during play! The two boys used some ...

  Whew, this was one busy week! I think all this snow has really got us all feeling a little stir crazy being stuck inside! To end our week, however, J brought in a special surprise for the class 😊 At the end of the day today the boys got to spend some time coloring on some personalized shirts! It was so fun to finally color on our clothes, an activity that usually happens anyway, but today was the most appropriate.  Have a great long weekend! We will see you all on Tuesday!

  The kids in the morning have started showing some interest in letters! This morning some of the kids chose to engage a little more with some letters by painting. Canvases were prepared ahead of time with masking tape to create each letter. It was up to each child how he wanted to paint the letters. B took to his hands because what's more fun than squishing paint between your fingers?! J decided he was more of a paintbrush kind of guy and gently painted a rainbow of colors onto a letter.  We haven't painted in a long time and it was nice to get back into it! The boys always enjoy a good painting experience and usually turn it into a sensory one too. At the end of the day the boys dove into a box full of magnetic letters where J proudly told us each letter and the occasional number. The other boys watched him as he said the number or letter and put it on the board. Within a few seconds everyone was trying to name letters as they put them on the board. It was a great imitation ...

Here's a little compilation of some joy from this morning! Nothing better than dancing, pretend play, successfully building, and playing some music to brighten up this gloomy day. Enjoy all the smiles and laughter from today, we hope it brings a big smile to all your faces! 

  The last two days we have had activities out revolving around taking care of others, but today something happened where a friend noticed how we are taken care of here at school! While playing in the collaboratory, L noticed a familiar face out in the hallway. It was one of our favorite custodians, Ms. Laverne! As she was cleaning up right outside of the room,  L took a particular interest as she used her broom to sweep something up.  L turned and looked at me, then pointed at Laverne. She noticed him looking right back her and they had a little conversation through the glass 😊 L continued to watch Ms. Laverne take care of our school for all of us! We get to see Ms. Laverne and Mr. Kevin a few times a day, but this was the first time someone noticed them taking care of our things. It was such a sweet moment!  Although are kids see all kinds of different people every day, their role in their lives at school isn't always obvious. Even though we have been limited in o...

  As we continue our journey of taking care of others in the Pine class, the boys took some time after snack to make sure our babydolls got some food too! Taking care of others is such an important skill we learn as we grow through life and can be taught at a young age. By engaging in pretend play by feeding, rocking, and playing with these babies, the boys are learning to take care of someone other than themselves. It is developmentally appropriate to be concerned with oneself, but we can begin to teach simple caretaking skills through this with babydolls. Since so many of our families have new babies in the home, we thought this would be a perfect way to have the boys become little helpers.  Have a great rest of your day and see you all tomorrow!   

  Welcome to a new week in the Pine room! This week we are focusing on the core words: put, in, on, and a good question word, where. We will be reading "Put Me In the Zoo" that features these words in all different contexts throughout the week.  This morning, the boys had lots of choices to practice those different words through a variety of activities. One in particular was to create bird feeders! The boys have shown interest in animals and taking care of other living things so we thought the bird feeders would be a great idea! To get some inspiration we watched some this  live bird feeder camera  to see which birds came to visit and what they were eating.  Wow was this activity great for some OT skills! We didn't have any bird seed so we figured cheerios on a pipe cleaner would do the trick. This was a tough activity! Not only did the boys have to resist the urge to eat the cheerios, they also needed to use their small fingers to put the round cereal onto a pi...